


The Hand You Are Dealt

by daisygal18



Category: Twilight (Movies), Twilight Series - All Media Types, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Imprinting, Loss, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-26
Updated: 2017-12-03
Packaged: 2019-01-05 14:33:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12191772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daisygal18/pseuds/daisygal18
Summary: She thought no one would ever care if she existed. He was convinced no one like her did. Life has broken her, and he always did love to fix things.





	1. Grief Changes You

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!
> 
> I started a Jacob/OC story a while back and just lost interest in it. I wanted to try again with a story a little closer to my heart. The female protagonist gets a lot of her hurt from hurts I myself have experienced. You know what they say... write what you know. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy this, because it’s been very personal for me to write it. 
> 
> Grey Clarke is 5’7” with subtle curves, her skin is pale and her eyes are blue. She has long dark brown hair that she frequently runs her fingers through. She curses a lot, and has a very twisted sense of humor sometimes and has a very intense love for novels set in another time. 
> 
> I hope you love her.

My whole life had played out like some sort of forgotten joke that no one found funny. 

My childhood had been one tumultuous event after another. My mother was sick for as long as I could remember. She had a very bad wreck when I was just a baby and her health just kept deteriorating with the following years, by the time I was a teenager I was the caretaker. She was a great mom though, she loved me fully, she taught me how to be a strong person. I would always be grateful for her. 

I was a love child born of an adulterous relationship between my mother and father, he was twelve years her senior and had a wife with two children in their teens. My mother was young, and while I knew it took two to tango I couldn’t help but think my father should have known better. My sudden arrival brought everything to light, ending their relationship and his marriage. He hadn’t wanted anything to do with me my entire life. I remember being in middle school and finally asking mom why all of my father’s day projects had to made out to her. That’s when she told me about him, in a very G rated way. I decided to pursue a relationship and at first it seemed promising but I soon realized, even with my child mind, that he saw me as a mistake. My father, I learned, did not like to be proven wrong. I was walking proof that he had fucked up, and he hated me for it, as if I had asked to be born. 

My father's rejection had brought on a whole new mess of problems when I became a teenager. I acted out, stayed out past my curfew, got drunk with boys I didn’t know. I would only ever kiss them, but that didn’t stop them from trying. They would use all the pretty words to try and get into my pants, but I knew better. I knew how a man could use his words to get you to do what they wanted, my father had broken my heart long before any of them could, and I hated the man, but at least it had made me cautious. This worried my mother even more than the drinking and the partying, she said I was too young to be so jaded. I had kissed her cheek and told her she was all I ever needed. I could see the troubled thoughts behind her blue eyes that were also mine. 

Then when I was eighteen, mom died, I got a phone call from an aunt that I hardly spoke to when I was drinking at a fire one night. I had stood and paced away from the fire as she told me that mom had had another heart attack followed by a stroke that rendered her brain dead. I looked at my phone after we hung up and I had several missed calls from her several hours earlier, but I hadn’t answered. I was too busy drowning my depression, and she had needed me. I crumpled in the field surrounded by strangers. No one came to check on me. I finally found the strength to stand and get into my car and drive to the hospital where I told her goodbye with whiskey on my breath. 

The only person who had ever given two shits about me was dead. 

My life became a dark blur after her funeral. She had left me a small life insurance policy which I put most of in savings, and the rest I drank away. I lost too much weight, and drank until I couldn’t remember my name. Dad never checked on me, he didn’t even come to her funeral, I felt entirely alone and forgotten. I was supposed to go to college but I declined the full ride I was offered and spent my nights drunk, and my days asleep. 

That was my existence for almost a year after she left this earth, then one day when sobriety caught up with me, so did everything I had been running from. It was like mom had pulled me from the darkness. I took a long look in the mirror and I didn’t like who I saw. My mother had been so loved, so many people had come to the funeral, people who I had never even met. They all told me of her kindness and her loyalty. They told me I looked like her, but I couldn’t tell them that’s where the similarities ended. I was as selfish as she was kind, and I hadn’t been there when she needed me most. I hated what I had become, and on that cold winter day I decided to fix it. I called the school and begged them for another chance, they said I had shot this year but if I was serious I could start the following year. So then I took some money from the savings mom had left, rented out our house, and started exploring the country. She had never gone anywhere because of me, and she had always said how much she wanted me to see the world. So I decided I would do it for her. Then I would go to school and make something of myself, for her. 

That’s how I ended up in the middle of nowhere Washington. I hadn’t planned on coming here, I usually just went places on a whim. I had explored the deserts of Arizona, and put my feet in be Pacific Ocean. Then one morning I was having breakfast in a tiny diner in San Francisco, looking through a hiking book when I saw a picture of the forests of the Olympic Peninsula. It was so green, it reminded me of my home in Tennessee after a good rain. So that had become my next destination. I decided to spend some time on the trails camping, I had always loved being outside. I stocked up on some cold weather gear and filled up my tank of gas and drove north. 

I started the trail with several other hikers, but we all soon found our own way. I was two days in when I came to a small rock face that I decided to climb, I knew the view would be worth it. I climbed the rocks and I thought of mom, as I often did, being on my own and embracing it gave me a lot of perspective. I was so distracted by my thoughts that I didn’t realize I had placed my foot on a loose rock, I fell backwards and heard a hard snap and pain in my right leg. My pack broke the impact for my back thank goodness, but I cried out and tried to sit forward. The pain in my leg shot through again and I hissed, I felt warmth on my head and touched my eyebrow to find a cut there bleeding pretty profusely, as head wounds often did. 

“Fuck.” I whimpered, I pulled my pants leg up and my ankle was already swollen to twice its normal size. I looked around, it had been a day since I had seen another living soul and dread settled into my belly. 

I was sure I would die out here. I would become some national headline when they finally found me. 

‘Grey Clarke’s body finally found after years of going missing!’

I choked back a sob, I had no one that would miss me for a while. My neighbor kept in touch with me about the new tenants of my house, but it could be weeks before she checked in again. I was entirely alone. I huffed and tried to drag myself to a nearby tree to try and stand, my ankle screamed in protest but I tried my best to ignore it. I heard movement from my right and I jerked just in time to see a flash of pale movement. What the hell was that?

Fear gripped me as I heard the movement again to my left. I swallowed and pushed my back into the tree and grabbed for a rock. 

“Who’s there?” I called, my voice was scratchy. Movement again from my right and I jerked my head in the direction. 

“Listen here, fuck stick! Whatever game you’re playing isn’t funny!” I called out. 

“Such language from such a pretty mouth.” A velvet voice said, I looked up to find a man standing in front of me, where had he come from?

He was beautiful, his skin was paler than even my own and he had dark hair that was shaggy. That’s not what sent my entire flight reflex on high alert though, it was his eyes, they were red… red like blood. 

“It’s okay little lamb… I’ll try to be gentle.” He said as he crept closer. 

I closed my eyes and waited for death to take me.


	2. First Meetings

.J.

——

It had started out like every other day. 

I began my patrols at three in the morning like I always did. There was a nomad snooping around the area and I wanted someone on it constantly. I had officially taken over the Alpha position a year ago after Emily gave birth to the first pup of our pack. Sam didn’t phase as often to help with the baby, and my wolf grew stronger and more determined to take his birthright with each passing day. It was time, and Sam bowed out nobly. It had taken some getting used to, but leading the guys came naturally to me. Pretty much all of them had an imprint now, save for a few of the younger ones. I took the shit shifts because I knew none of them liked to be away at odd hours like that. 

I was still licking my wounds from Bella’s marriage two years earlier. She had returned from her honeymoon with red eyes and Sam and I had nearly killed each other in the fight that followed. In my eyes the treaty was null, but Sam didn’t see it that way. I understood now that I was alpha, but at the time the pain had been so great that I wanted to hurt them. In my eyes, they had killed her. 

My friendship with Bella never recovered. She tried to seek me out but I always turned away from her. She wasn’t the same, she didn’t even sound the same when she spoke. The girl I loved was gone. I contented myself with being the best leader I could be. They all respected me, the wolf was content for the most part. 

I was running along my usual border as the sun came up when I caught the sickly sweet stench of leech. I stopped and buried my muzzle in the earth, it was fresh, only minutes old. I threw my head in the air and let out a howl to signal the others to phase. I knew they would feel the call, so I started to follow the trail while I waited. The scent after a while mixed with something painfully alluring, the scent was like lavender and vanilla mixed with just female. I followed it, my paws pulling me in an odd pattern until I stopped dead. 

It all happened in the span of a few seconds but it might as well have been a lifetime. 

“It’s okay little lamb… I’ll try to be gentle.” I heard the smooth voice of the leech. 

I could see his back but that’s not what had my attention. It was the girl with her back to the tree. She looked up at him in terror and as soon as I laid eyes on her my entire world shifted. I stumbled forward from the force of it. She closed her eyes, like she was accepting her fate. Everything inside me snapped at the danger she was currently in. 

Kill. Protect. Mate. 

My mind was saying over and over. I let out a loud roar and dove for the offending creature who was so enthralled with his meal that he hadn’t even sensed my presence. My teeth sunk into his head and I pulled him away from the girl. I heard a gasp from her place by the tree but my eyes were zeroed in on the target that dared to threaten her. 

‘Jake, I’m here… where are… oh shit.’ The voice of Embry entered my mind and he saw everything I had seen in the last several minutes. 

I ignored his inner monologue as I locked eyes on the male leech, who was crouched in a defensive stance. 

‘Jake, just wait, I’m almost to your location.’ Embry pleaded. 

‘He threatened her.’ I growled lowly, the wolf was livid, protective nature had taken over. 

‘I know, brother, but if you get hurt she will be vulnerable.’ Embry tried to say in a calming tone. 

The wolf simmered a little at his words. I couldn’t allow myself to become injured and possibly leave her alone with the monster. 

“Down doggy.” The leech hissed, its eyes were black as we circled each other. I made sure to keep myself between him and the girl. 

“You’ve been tracking me for some time, do you really think you can get me now?” He murmured lowly. I snarled and snapped in his direction and he chuckled evilly. 

“Why do you protect the little snack so fiercely?” He wondered out loud. 

“Is she special to you, wolf?” He taunted and I growled. 

‘He’s trying to get into your head, don’t let him.’ Sam’s voice was in my head now. 

“She smells delicious, I can see the appeal.” He said and I snarled as I lunged but he dodged my attack with a swift roll and then we were doing our dance again. 

“How every interesting.” He mused. 

‘One minute.’ Embry said. 

“What if I make a deal with you? You leave the girl to me, and then I leave your precious lands?” He said with a raised eyebrow. 

I rose my hackles at his words and growled low and dangerous. The leech chuckled. 

“She’s very special then.” He said in an amused voice. “How fun.” He mused with a sinister grin, he jerked his head to the side just as Embry burst through the tree line. He dove for the leech but the creature turned and bolted from the small clearing. 

‘Sam and I can handle this, go to her.’ Embry said, and I couldn’t argue, my body was pulled to her. 

She had seen the entire ordeal, and she watched me approach her with wide terrified eyes. She held a rock in her shaking hand as she stared at me. I crept forward slowly as to not scare her. 

“Please don’t kill me.” She whimpered, I detected a slight southern accent that was appealing to my ears. 

She sat very still as I sniffed her hair and down to her stomach to make sure she was okay. There was blood coming from a cut on her forehead. When I got to her legs I whined, she was hurt pretty badly. She was breathing rapidly and I could hear her heart beating irregularly, I was worried for her well being. She had a pack on her back so I surmised she was a hiker, she was completely alone, what if I hadn’t been patrolling? A shiver ran through me at the thought of what would have happened. 

“I must have hit my head. None of this is real.” She mumbled to herself. 

“That man had red eyes, and now there’s a wolf the size of a thoroughbred sniffing me.” She said as she took a shaky breath. 

I whined and nudged her hand with my nose. Her hand shook but she touched my snout softly. Her touch calmed my agitated senses. I settled down beside her and she slowly ran her hand up to my ears. I watched her as she stared at my large form. 

“I’ve always liked wolves.” She said softly. “I wrote a paper about them in highschool, I always admired the family bond amongst the pack… envied it really.” She said to herself. 

“I was worried I would die alone out here… no one would miss me, you see, so even if you’re a figment of my imagination, at least I’m not alone.” She sighed. 

Her words brought all these questions to my mind. Who was this girl I had imprinted on? Why did her eyes look so broken? I wanted to help her. 

‘Jake!’ Sam’s voice cut into my mind and I stood on high alert. 

‘He got away.’ Embry said and I could hear the anger in his voice. 

‘What?’ I snarled. 

‘He ran to the cliffs and jumped like the redheaded leech that was after Bella.’ Sam explained and I cursed. 

‘How’s your girl?’ Embry asked and I turned to look at her again. 

She had her eyes closed and was leaning her head against the tree. I was worried for her mental state, she didn’t seem nearly as freaked as I would expect. 

‘Her leg is hurt pretty badly, she needs to go to the hospital.’ I said. 

‘You’ll have to phase.’ Sam said gently. 

‘I’m scared she’s in shock, what if showing her now is too much?’ I worried. 

‘You can’t help her as the wolf right now.’ Sam said slowly. 

I nosed her chin and she opened her eyes, the imprint stirred in my chest looking into her big blue eyes. 

“Your eyes… they seem so human.” She said as she touched my nose. I didn’t blink, I stared into her eyes as I let the wolf go and the man return. 

“Oh my fuck!” She shouted and looked me up and down. I felt embarrassed and grabbed my shorts to pull them on. 

“Hey, I’m not going to hurt you.” I tried to say in a soothing voice. 

“Stay away from me!” She shouted and threw a rock at me. I ducked easily and found myself amused. 

“What’s your name?” I asked as I held my hands up. 

“I’m dead aren’t I?” She said, she didn’t take her eyes off me but I could see her hand reaching for another rock. She threw it and I ducked once more. 

“You're not dead.” I said as I smiled, “Thankfully.” 

“You… you were a wolf.” She said, she craned her neck like she thought my wolf might be hiding behind me. 

“I know this all seems very strange to you.” I said and she threw another rock. 

“We passed strange five minutes ago buddy! This is damn right IMPOSSIBLE! I’ve finally lost it, after everything my brain has officially snapped!” She touched a hand to her forehead and I stepped forward, worried. Her eyes shot open at the sound of my movement and I stopped. 

“I will explain everything to you, I swear, but we really need to get your leg looked at.” I pleaded and she looked at the offending appendage like she had forgotten. 

“That’s funny, you would think if I were dead then my leg wouldn’t still be broken.” She mused. 

“I promise you’re not dead.” I insisted. I knelt to gently touch her leg, she whimpered and my eyes shot to hers. 

“Who are you?” She asked, she looked into my eyes, searching, and I knew she felt it… the pull. 

“My name is Jacob Black.” I held my hand out and she took it slowly, the moment our hands met my heart started beating faster and I had the urge to pull her to me, to keep her safe. 

“Grey Clarke.” She said in a small voice. I smiled at her. 

“Grey like the color?” I asked with my head cocked. She made a face. 

“I guess I could ask you the same… Black.” She said in a teasing tone. 

“You’re definitely going to have to get this splinted.” I told her and she sighed. 

“Great, I’m in a completely foreign place to me and now I will be hospitalized.” She grumbled. 

“Do you not have friends nearby you could call?” She shook her head as she surveyed her leg. 

“Family?” I asked again and her eyes shot to mine, I flinched from the pain, like I could feel it. 

“There’s no one.” She said quietly, she had no idea that that was the farthest from the truth. She had me, and my entire pack, she had family. 

“I’m going to lift you, the road is about two miles through the trees. Then I’ll have a friend pick us up.” I told her slowly so she could gather the info. 

I helped her maneuver her pack from her back and put it on my back. Then I knelt gently and lifted her into my arms, the wolf in me hummed in contentment to have her so close, and the man felt the same. She fit in my arms like a puzzle piece that was always meant to be there. She hissed as she situated herself in my arms and then I began walking us towards the road. 

She was quiet for a moment but it was as if I could feel the gears in her mind working. It took everything to not beg her to speak, I wanted to know her. To know everything. 

“What are you thinking?” I asked finally after ten minutes of silence. She looked up at me and her eyes narrowed a moment. 

“I’m just wondering when I’ll wake up in a mental institution where they tell me I’ve been having delusions of werewolves and sociopaths with red eyes.” She said and I snorted. 

“You’re not crazy, and the sociopath was a vampire.” I said lowly as I stepped over a large tree branch, she sucked in a breath. 

“A vampire?” She whispered in a small voice. 

I only nodded, I could hear the quickening of her heartbeat and it made the wolf anxious. 

“So he was going to…” she swallowed and I nodded again.

“Jesus Christ almighty.” She murmured. 

“You saved my life.” She said as she looked at me. 

“Why?” Her eyes narrowed and I could nearly see the wall she had put up. 

I cleared my throat awkwardly before speaking, “It’s sort of my reason for existence.” Not only to protect humans, but her specifically. She wasn’t ready to hear that though. 

“To save humans from vampires?” 

“Yes.” I said with a nod. 

“The other wolf in the clearing… he’s like you?” 

“Yes, there are more of us. We are the largest pack in the history of the tribe.” My voice held some pride, we were strong, and we worked hard. 

“So do all Native American tribes turn into giant wolves?” 

I chuckled, “No, just the Quileute tribe.” 

She nodded to herself and I was very surprised she was taking it all so calmly, it was probably the mixture of shock and adrenaline, along with the imprint. 

“Why were you hiking alone?” I asked softly, I had been wanting to know. It made the protectiveness of the imprint flare to know she had put herself at such a risk. I had the thought again… what if I had left my house five minutes later? She would have died and that thought… it nearly made me stumble. 

“I’m always alone.” She said with a shrug. 

I opened my mouth to ask another question but someone shouted my name. I looked up to find Sam jogging towards us, his old Toyota truck was pulled on the side of the road. 

I nodded to Sam as he came to a stop in front of us. 

“Did Embry go to check the coastline?” I asked, the seriousness of the situation with the nomad coming back tenfold now that Grey was out of immediate danger. 

“Yes, he woke Quil for his shift early so they could make sure the leech doesn’t come on the beaches.” I smirked, Quil was not a morning person. I could only imagine the time Embry was having with him. 

Grey shifted in my arms and I looked down at her, she was watching Sam with the same guarded eyes I had seen earlier. 

“I need to check in with them, draw a plan together. No more single shifts, we have to double up so no one is left exposed.” My voice held a tinge if alpha order and I hated to use the power, but I didn’t want to hear any crap from anyone about double shifts. The safety of the humans on the reservation and surrounding towns was more important than their carnal needs. 

Sam nodded and he looked down at Grey with a comforting smile, he and Emily were the best with new wolves and imprints. I think it stemmed from neither of them having anyone to turn to when the supernatural world was suddenly dropped in their laps. 

“Hey, I’m Sam.” He said in a friendly tone. 

“Grey Clarke.” She said lowly, still watching him with guarded eyes. 

“This isn’t how you planned on spending your morning I’m sure.” He joked and Grey smiled a little. 

“No, I regularly plan on finding out fairy tales are real, don’t you?” She retorted and I noticed Sam smiled at her fondly. 

“I’m gonna take you to get that leg fixed up while Jake deals with the other pups.” He told her and Grey sighed softly but nodded. 

Sam looked to me and stepped forward, his arms open ready to take her from me. A deep growl rumbled from me and I jerked her closer to my chest. Sam watched me with careful eyes, his head bowed just slightly to show submission. It was instinct. 

“Jake, I have to take her so her leg can get fixed.” He spoke slowly. The wolf was shaking within me, begging to be released, the thought of our mate being taken away so soon after finding her being too much, and just when she was almost breakfast for a leech. 

My whole frame had started to shake but it all stopped suddenly when a small hand touched the center of my chest. I looked down to a pair of blue eyes, they didn’t hold an ounce of fear. Just a softness that was foreign and warm. 

“I’ll be okay.” She whispered, never blinking, as if she knew exactly what to do to calm the beast within, he settled and I blinked back to reality. I shook my head, and look to Sam, his eyes held an understanding. 

“I’m sorry, brother.” I said lowly, so only his ears could hear. 

“Don’t apologize, it’s natural.” He said, again too low for Grey to hear. We shared a nod and I handed her off to him, still reluctantly. 

I watched him carry her to his truck, my heart hammering, nearly making me collapse from the urge to follow her everywhere. She looked at me over Sam’s shoulder and my heart stuttered. She smiled reassuringly at me, like she wasn’t the one with a broken ankle. I shook my head in awe of this girl who had turned my entire world on its axis. 

When Sam’s truck was no longer in sight I phased swiftly and began running towards the beach. Embry, Quil, and now Paul’s thoughts jumbling into mine. 

The dark haired leech would die for threatening her.

**Author's Note:**

> Be kind.


End file.
